Negotiations

My mind has proven itself a formidable enemy and I am currently attempting peace talks.

To write a book one must find oneself writing. Specifically a story. This is my battle. I have not begun what I fear I will never venture. It is this fear that, strangely, binds my fingers—puppets—and henceforth my mind—puppet master. The strings have become tangled and they wind around and around, twisting and knotting until only a noose for dreams is visible in the circus of twine and flesh. Will this be where I see my dream buried? Will it prove itself to have been always smoke and mirrors which for a moment flashed at me a desire and a will? I cannot wait for the bindings to fall lamely at my feet—their strength unwound in the presence of some miraculous energy. No, if I truly want to take on this feat I must fight against my restraints and transform a mirror into a canvas. I know that writing a book is not something that comes about merely on a few boring Sunday afternoons or a night or two of inspired ideas. Word by word it comes, and most of those words will have to be erased and rewritten, shuffled and recalculated. But I cannot even write one sentence. I have no words to even critique or muse upon. What story waits to be written, eagerly pressing up against a stained glass prison for which there is no door save the one that has been barred with a sign labeled ‘Fear?’ It is this silenced prisoner which I long to know, that I force myself not to know as I would never want to paint its story on a canvas with ripped, jagged corners and colors of coffee stains speckling the surface. That is my problem. I see an empty, imperfect canvas and I think there is no right color to cover over its blemishes. This is how I fail.

Peace talks continue. Bindings weakened.